Any PC that’s lost, sold or given away can retain your old data—even if you deleted files or reset it. Our CCleaner experts give you all the critical steps you can take to prevent data that’s left behind from being stolen.

1. Quick Guide: The Fast & Easy Way

• 3 Steps to Securely Wipe Your Data on Your Windows 10/11 PC 
• 3 Steps to Securely Wipe Your Data on Your Mac 

2. In-Depth Guide: The Paranoid Way (safely destroy files on HDDs and SSDs) ✂️

• Clear: Wipe your HDD with CCleaner
• Purge: Wipe your SSD with Secure Erase tools
  • Use Secure Erase with Western Digital SSDs
  • Use Secure Erase with Samsung SSDs
  • Use Secure Erase in your BIOS/UEFI
  • Use a 3rd party tool 
• Destroy: Physically destroy your HDD or SSD 🔨

3. The Experiment: How some data was left behind even after a complete Windows wipe

1. Quick Guide: The Fast Way 

Wait, what? Deleted files aren’t deleted?

Yes! Even when you delete your files from a hard drive, it can easily be restored using free recovery tools or professional forensic software. This is a very common misconception: When you format a drive or delete files, your date will NOT be erased. 

From your precious memories to your private documents, contracts, emails or invoices, any data on an old PC and an abandoned hard drive can easily be recovered, opening yourself up to a lot of risks. This is critical when:

• You want to sell or give away your PC: You don’t want the future owner of your computer having instant access to all your files, by using a free recovery tool such as Recuva. 
• You are not using your PC or leaving it behind: If you’re moving and you can’t (or don’t want to) take your PC with you, make sure that no one can access and recover your files.

The reason: When you delete a file or format a drive, the data does not get destroyed. It simply gets marked as “Free space” that can be overwritten by new data, such as a new program or a photo you store on your PC. Until this happens, however, the data remains intact. Luckily, there’s a safe way to securely wipe all your data, making it pretty much impossible to recover. 

3 Steps to Securely Wipe Your Data on Your Windows 10/11 PC

1. Backup all your data onto a handy USB drive and take it with you or upload it to a cloud storage provider such as OneDrive or Dropbox. Then delete all your personal data from your old PC: Go through all your folders (Desktop, Documents, Photos…), delete them and then empty the Recycle Bin.
   
   
   
   Now make sure to delete it from the Recycle Bin. Things don’t stop here as any file can be brought back with ease.
   
   
2. To wipe this data for good, run CCleaner. Go to Tools and select Drive Wiper. Select your hard drive C: and hit the Wipe button. If you have an external hard drive, you can select the Entire Drive option. This will now overwrite all the empty space (previously occupied by your data), destroying the content in the process. This also works with an external USB drive as seen below:
   
   
3. Once done, you can wipe Windows and all your programs: Go to your Start menu, click on Settings, System, Recovery, Reset PC, Remove Everything, and make sure you select the “Clean the drive” (or Clean the Drive on some versions) option to ensure everything gets deleted.
   
   

With the combination of wiping the files with CCleaner and Windows own Reset feature, your data will be nearly impossible to recover. In fact, we’ve used our very own Recuva and another product (Disk Drill) just to be sure. 

Aside from some (destroyed, mind you) system files, there were no files left behind. After another round of CCleaner Drive Wiper there was even less discoverable, but in general one wipe cycle should be enough! 

3 Steps to Securely Wipe Your Data on Your  Mac

If you own an Apple MacBook (Pro, Air), iMac or a Mac Pro, you can use a very simple method to make your drive unrecoverable: Encryption. You can use an easy way to format the drive and encrypt all data, which renders them unrecoverable. Here’s how:

1. Backup your files to the cloud (iCloud, OneDrive, Dropbox) or to an external USB drive. Now, just to be sure: Delete it and empty the Trash Bin.
2. Now, turn off your Mac. Turn it back on and:
1. On a new Mac with M1 chip: Push the power button and keep on holding it until you see the startup options appear.
   
   
   
   
   From here, select Options.
2. On an Intel based Mac: Press the power button and then immediately push and hold the Command + R key until you see the recovery screen.
3. Alright, we’re now ready to dive in: Fire up Disk Utility. This will give you the option to wipe and encrypt your drive.
   
   
   
   On the next screen, select your drive on the top left side (usually called Macintosh HD).
   
   Click the Erase button until you see the screen above. Now, instead of regularly formatting the drive (which would make it easy for outsiders to recover your files), you’ll want to use the APFS (Encrypted) option which completely encrypts all data using multiple keys and a pretty much unbreakable encryption method. Use a long and secure password to start the encryption! That’s it.

2. In-Depth Guide: The Paranoid Guide to Safely Wiping Files on HDDs and SSDs

The quick and easy way should be enough to safely destroy files in most cases. In rare circumstances and with the right forensics, though, parts of your data could still be recovered (with a lot of effort, mind you - but it’s not impossible!). This applies mostly to SSDs, as they work differently and could retain some data even after a CCleaner drive wipe and Windows 10/11 reset. That’s why we’ll walk you through multiple options which work best for traditional, old-school hard drives (you know, the big ones with spinning platters) and new solid state drives (SSDs). 

Following the Guidelines for Media Sanitization (nist.gov) (National Institute of Standards and Technology), the three stages for a complete SSD wipe are Clear, Purge and Destroy:

1. Clear: Delete and overwrite data with zeros. This would be done with the CCleaner Drive Wiper method.
2. Purge: Using a specific command of the hard drive called “Secure Erase” all files will be irrevocably destroyed. The Secure Erase option is available through software that’s provided by your SSD maker or in your PCs system program BIOS (or called UEFI nowadays). 
3. Destroy: That’s obviously the ultimate option. As the NIST puts it nicely: “Shred, Disintegrate, Pulverize, or Incinerate by burning the device in a licensed incinerator.” This requires you to do some physical fiddling, but it’s a safe way. 

Here’s how to thoroughly perform these options:

Clear: Wiping an old-school HDD using CCleaner's Drive Wiper

Most external USB hard drives and a lot of older PCs and laptops come with “hard disk drives”, which store data on a spinning magnetic platter. CCleaners Drive Wiper option can wipe entire hard drives or just the free disk space multiple times (!) to make sure the files are properly destroyed. Here’s how:

1. Open CCleaner and go to the Tools section. From here, go to Drive Wiper:
   
   
   Select the disk you want to wipe. Note that you can’t wipe the drive with your Windows installation, which usually is Drive C (that would be a bit like putting your own hand in a shredder). However, you can wipe all free data, so in such a case you should delete all your personal filesanddelete them from your recycle bin. 
2. Now you can select drive C and use the WipeFree Space Only option. For any other drive (external USB, secondary data drive) you should use the Ente Drive option.
3. To be on the safe side, you can choose multiple overwrite options:
   
   
   But rest assured that anything over 3 passes is probably overkill and will not leave behind anything recoverable.

Purge: Wiping an SSD using the Secure Erase option

Solid State Drives (SSDs) work differently as data is stored in cells which have a limited lifespan. To protect drives, SSD makers have implemented a feature called “Wear Leveling” which evenly distributes data across cells to protect them from wearing out - on top, they preserve a certain portion of the drive in case cells are starting to fail.

Now, fully overwriting drives with the CCleaner Drive Wiper mentioned above completely fills up the disk with fake data, so a majority of cells will be overwritten and your data will be destroyed. In our tests we were not able to restore any files other than some system files.

However, if you don’t want to take any chances, you’ll have to go with the  “Secure Erase” option, which gives the SSD a hardware command to tell it to fully wipe the drive and destroy all data. It actually causes a quick voltage spike to all those cells which wipes the SSD clean very quickly. 

Unfortunately, Windows does not support this feature so you’ll have to either use tools provided by SSD makers (such as Western Digital or Samsung) or see if your laptops or PCs BIOS/UEFI system program offers this. Below we'll dive deep into three examples to show you how this works. Check out these quick links to the respective tools that support Safe Erase:

• Samsung: Magician & SSD Tools & Software Download | Samsung Semiconductor Global
• Western Digital SSDs: Software and Firmware Downloads | WD Support (wdc.com)
• Seagate: Seagate Support US
• Crucial: Crucial Storage Executive Tool | Firmware Download | Crucial.com
• Intel SSDs (Optane): Support for Intel® SSD Toolbox
• Toshiba: SSD Utility Management Software | KIOXIA
• XPG: Downloads
• Kingston: SSD Manager - Kingston Technology

If you don't know what SSD you have, download our free tool Speccy which scans your PC's components from top to bottom. Under the 'Storage' section it tells you what model drive you’ve got:

Use your favorite search engine to find the manufacturers page and see if they offer a toolbox that allows you to securely wipe a drive. Let’s explore some of these tools and examples:

Example 1 - For Samsung SSD owners

Got a Samsung SSD, such as a 970 Evo or a 980 Pro? They’re usually labeled “Samsung MZVLK” in your device manager. Then you should download and install Samsung Magician which can be found here. Once installed, go to Secure Erase in the Data Management section.

If your SSD is not your primary drive you should be able to instantly wipe the drive. If it’s the primary drive with your Windows installation and all your programs you’ll need to create a bootable USB drive. In essence, you’ll be loading a mini operating system from a USB drive that will allow you to wipe away everything on your disk. 

Let’s do it: Insert a thumb drive larger than 1 GB and hit Start. Once that’s over with, reboot your computer. A very old school looking screen should appear that will allow you to safely erase the drive. If this doesn’t happen, you need to do two things:

Enable boot from USB: Usually your PC starts from your main hard disk (drive C). However, since we want to load the Secure Erase feature from USB, you need to instruct it to load from USB. Here’s how: Turn on your PC and hit either the DEL, F2 or F12 button to enter the boot menu or the BIOS/UEFI main menu. Your PC will tell you which button to press, such a

• Now, to make sure your PC boots from USB, you need to find the Boot menu order option and make sure the priority is set to USB. This looks and works differently across many PCs, so we can’t go into every single menu:

On a MSI desktop PC you need to drag the UEFI USB Hard Disk to the left

On another Razer laptop it might look like this

• Once that’s selected, you should see the Secure Erase menu below.
• Disable Secure Boot: Modern PCs and laptops protect themselves from unauthorized USB access and only load up verified operating systems. If your PC still refuses to load the USB, go into the BIOS/UEFI as outlined above and look for an option called Secure Boot - and turn it off.

Phew! We know, a lot of work. But eventually you should be seeing the screen you’ve been waiting for:

Make sure to select the drive you want to wipe and hit Continue (you will need to confirm this multiple times!). That’s it. Done. 

Example 2 - For Western Digital Owners

Own a WD SSD? Then you can also create a bootable USB drive that will let you wipe your drive using the Secure Erase function. You’ll need to get the WD Dashboard from this page and install it.

Go to Tools and ERASE DRIVE. For all external or secondary WD drives, you can simply hit the ERASE NOW button. But if you want to erase your Windows drive, insert a USB thumb drive and click on CREATE USB DRIVE. 

Ok now it’s time for a reboot! The Drive Wiper should appear now - if not, make sure your PC boots from USB and the Secure Boot feature is disabled as mentioned above. 

Example 3 - The BIOS/UEFI options

The BIOS or UEFI is the basic program that controls every aspect of your computer. Some UEFI programs have a built-in Safe Erase option which (should!) work regardless of the hard drive maker. It’s worth a shot if your hard drive maker doesn’t offer a tool. To get into the BIOS or UEFI, as mentioned above, turn on your PC and hit the F2, Del or F12 key (follow the instructions seen when you turn on your computer).

In our example above, a PC with a MSI BIOS/UEFI you’ll find the Secure Erase+ feature under Settings and Advanced.

What if my SSD maker doesn’t have a toolbox with Safe Erase?

Then your last resort is either completely destroying the hardware (see below) or to get a product called PartedMagic. This is essentially a full version of Linux that can be run from a USB drive and it supports the Safe Erase command for all SSDs. It does cost $13 but you can keep it forever if you don’t opt for the subscription: Parted Magic LLC – Store. Once purchased,  here’s what you need to do:

1. Grab a USB drive greater than 4 GB and download the file PartedMagic “ISO” file that was sent to you after the purchase.
2. Next, download and start the program Rufus, which allows you to create a bootable USB thumb drive using that Parted Magic ISO you downloaded. Once installed, launch it and click on SELECT. Chose the ISO as seen below:
   
   
3. Next, hit the Start button and select the Write in ISO Image mode before hitting OK. Note: If Rufus needs to download some additional files, please do so and click Yes. After a few minutes the USB drive should be done. You can now use it to wipe any drive - on your own PC or any other for that matter. Just plug it in, make sure that your PC is set to boot from USB (see above).
4. You’ll now have an easy way to securely wipe your drive. From the first menu you see, choose one of the default settings:

Click on Erase and select the Safe Erase function for your drive.

Destroy: Fully Destroying Your Entire Drive

All of the above options did not work? Then why not just take the disk drive out and destroy it, incinerate it or take it with you to a safe place. Of course this involves using a screwdriver (regular or pentalobe) to open up a notebook or a PC and then finding the SSD, which look like long-ish chips that can be unscrewed and easily taken out:

On a desktop computer you might have to remove some special SSD covers which might look a bit like the picture directly above. On older computers, HDDs look a bit like this:

Now what do you do with this drive? As brutal as it sounds, for SSDs you will probably need to use a hammer until all the memory chips are destroyed. For old HDDs, you can follow this tutorial: 

How to Destroy Data on a Hard Disk PERMANENTLY! - YouTube

Now, as crazy as it might sound: Our advice would be to physically destroy these platters and dispose of each of them in separate locations (such as recycling stations) if you want to be absolutely sure. 

Can My Data Really Be Discovered? A Quick Experiment!

When you give away, sell or leave behind a computer, you can use the “Reset” feature built into Windows 10 and 11: It formats the drive, removes data and reinstalls the operating system from scratch.

However, in real life testing we found that this does not entirely remove files across the board. In fact, we used this procedure on PCs from HP, Dell, Acer, Lenovo and Razer and were able to recover files:

We deleted all personal files, emptied the Recycle Bin and then used the above mentioned Reset option. Now, after a thorough recovery attempt we were still able to find some files. 

All of the OneDrive folders were still visible as well as about 10-20 photos and some documents remained on the “Desktop” folder.. While this particular drive had thousands of photos and documents that could not be restored, there was still some data left. Which is why you should always delete the files, empty the bin, use an extra wiping tool, and then wipe the drive using the reset option mentioned above - clear, purge, and destroy, remember?

Does wiping my hard drive damage an SSD?

You might’ve heard that SSDs only have a limited lifespan. The cells wear out after multiple gigabytes written to them. Measured in TBW (Terabytes Written), on average a 500 GB SSD has a guaranteed TBW of 300 terabytes written.

A 2 TB drive is often more than 1000 TBW. So overwriting your entire drive using the method described can - in theory - shorten the lifespan of your drive. In reality, the average user won’t see this day happen. A majority of things you do on your PC involves “reading” from the drive (loading Windows, programs, and your files). To give you a real world example. This Samsung 970 Evo Plus was used in a gaming PC to download to and play games from:

After 3 years of usage, it had “only” 29 TB written to it - and that’s a lot given that dozens of games with hundreds of gigabytes in size were downloaded to it. If you’re just doing regular work (browsing, office work, light photo editing) you’ll see far less usage. 

The Samsung 970 Evo Plus has a guarantee of 1200 TBW, so it would take us 124 years (!) of continued usage until we’re starting to see the SSD fail. The SSD lifespan has just become a very academic argument.